1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to down link signal transmission from a base station of a cellular radio system to a remote station. In particular, the invention relates to adaptive control of multiple down link beams, beam powers and beam widths.
2. Description of Related Art
Cellular telephone systems are operated in environments that give rise to multi-path or reflections of the their signals, particularly in urban environments. In FIG. 1, base station transmitter 1 broadcasts its signal to remote station 2 (often mobile) along direct path 3. However, owing to the presence of tall building 4, transmitter 1 also broadcasts its signal to remote station 2 along indirect path 5, thus, giving rise to angular spread AS between the direction of arrival of direct path 3 at remote station 2 and the direction of arrival of indirect path 5 at remote station 2. Direct path 3 and indirect path 5 are recombined at remote station 2 where constructive and destructive superimposed signals cause random or what appears to be random fading and black out zones.
To reduce the effects of multi-path, known systems employ space time transmit diversity techniques. In FIG. 2, a known transmitter includes space time transmit diversity encoder 10, complex multipliers 12 and 14, and antennas 16 and 18. Space time transmit diversity encoder 10 processes input signal SIN into two channel signals CH1 and CH2. Multipliers 12 and 14 may impart a same orthogonalizing code OC on the two channel signals CH1 and CH2 to identify the two channels as containing information about input signal SIN; however, different orthogonal identifiers (e.g., pilot sequences or training sequences) are applied to the different antenna signals so that the remote station can separately identify the signals from the two antennas. The multiplied channel signals are transmitted on respective antennas 16 and 18 substantially spaced apart by a distance (e.g., 20 wavelengths). Such spaced apart antennas are referred to as diversity antennas. In multi-path environments severe fading results when different propagation paths sum destructively at the receiving antenna. Using diversity antennas, the probability that both signals CH1 and CH2 will be in deep fade is low since the two signals are likely to propagate over different paths such as the multi-paths 3 and 5. Diversity antennas may be omni-directional antennas or antennas directed at antenna sectors with overlayed sectors. When diversity antennas are sufficiently separated in space, they can be regarded as orthogonal since they propagate signals in non-correlated channels (i.e., paths).
Input signal SIN carries two symbols, S1 and S2, in time succession, the first symbol in symbol slot between 0 and T, and the second symbol in symbol slot between T and 2T. In FIG. 3, exemplary encoder 10 uses a QPSK modulation technique and includes time align register 20 and hold registers 22 to hold the two symbols. Base band carrier signal SBBC is inverted in inverter 24 to produce negative base band carrier -SBBC. QPSK modulator 26 encodes symbol S1 onto base band carrier signal SBBC to produce a modulated first symbol, and QPSK modulator 28 encodes symbol S1 onto negative base band carrier signal xe2x88x92SBBC to produce a modulated conjugate of the first symbol. QPSK modulator 30 encodes symbol S2 onto base band carrier signal SBBC to produce a modulated second symbol, and QPSK modulator 32 encodes symbol S2 onto negative base band carrier signal xe2x88x92SBBC to produce a modulated conjugate of the second symbol. The modulated conjugate of the second symbol is inverted in inverter 34 to produce a negative modulated conjugate of the second symbol. Analog multiplexer 36 switches the modulated first symbol into the first channel signal during the first symbol time slot (i.e., 0 to T, FIG. 2) and switches the negative modulated conjugate of the second symbol into the first channel signal during the second symbol time slot (i.e., T to 2T, FIG. 2) so that the signal on CH1 is [S1, - S2*]. Analog multiplexer 38 switches the modulated second symbol into the second channel signal during the first symbol time slot (i.e., 0 to T, FIG. 2) and switches the modulated conjugate of the first symbol into the second channel signal during the second symbol time slot (i.e., T to 2T, FIG. 2) so that the signal on CH2 is [S2, S1*].
In FIG. 2, code OC consists of one code applied to both multipliers 12, 14 that is used as a CDMA spreading function to isolate the two signals transmitted from antennas 16 and 18 from other signals that may generate co-channel interference. Multipliers 12 and 14, multiply the first and second channel signals before being transmitted through antennas 16 and 18. RF up converters are not shown for simplicity.
At remote station 2, a receiver receives signals from both antennas 16 and 18 on a single antenna, down-converts the signals, despreads the signals using code OC, and recovers a composite of channels CH1 and CH2 as transmitted from antennas 16 and 18, respectively. In the first symbol time slot between 0 and T, the composite QPSK modulated signal R1 is received (where R1=k11S1+k12S2), and in the second symbol time slot between T and 2T, the composite QPSK modulated signal R2 is received (where R2 =xe2x88x92k21S2*+k22S1* and the asterisk refers to a complex conjugate). Constant k11 is a transmission path constant from first antenna 16 to remote station 2 during the first time slot, constant k12 is a transmission path constant from second antenna 18 to remote station 2 during the first time slot, constant k21 is a transmission path constant from first antenna 16 to remote station 2 during the second time slot, and constant k22 is a transmission path constant from second antenna 18 to remote station 2 during the second time slot. The receiver derotates the channel to recover soft symbols S1xe2x80x2 and S2xe2x80x2, where
S1xe2x80x2=k11R1+k12R2 and S2xe2x80x2=k21R2*+k22R1*.
In this time space encoder technique, the first and second symbols are redundantly transmitted from separate antennas. The first symbol is encoded to be transmitted in both the first and second symbol time slots, and the second symbol is also encoded to be transmitted in both the first and second symbol time slots. The effect of this symbol recovery technique is that fading or drop out regions that may appear during one symbol time slot are less likely to appear during both symbol time slots when interleaving is also exploited. Interleaving is used before space-time coding to make adjacent bits less correlated in time. Since the received symbols are recovered from received signals during both time slots, R1 and R2, the effect of fading is diminished.
However, the prior art does not exploit advantages provided by independent power management of individual beams transmitted by different diversity type antennas to achieve greater spectral efficiency at the base station while minimizing co-channel interference. The prior art does not exploit advantages provided by spatial power or beam width management of independently directed beams to achieve greater spectral efficiency at the base station while minimizing co-channel interference. The prior art does not exploit advantages provided by angle of arrival diversity to achieve greater spectral efficiency at the base station while minimizing co-channel interference.
It is an object to the present invention to improve the spectral efficiency of transmissions from the base station. It is another object of the present invention to minimize co-channel interference. It is a further object to minimize undesired effects of fading and drop out.
These and other objects are achieved in a system that includes a base station and a remote station. The base station includes a space-time encoder, an antenna system, a transmitter, a base station receiver, and a power management controller. The space-time encoder encodes a stream of symbols into first and second space-time coded signals, and the transmitter transmits the first and second space-time coded signals at respective first and second initial transmit powers from the antenna system so as to form respective first and second radiation patterns. The base station receiver receives power coefficient indicator information from the remote station, and the power management controller determines first and second adjusted transmit powers based on the respective first and second initial transmit powers and the power coefficient indicator information.
In an alternative embodiment, a transmit station of a radio system includes a circuit to determine an angular power spectrum, a space-time encoder, and a transmitter. The space-time encoder encodes first and second symbols into first and second space-time coded signals, and the transmitter transmits the first and second space-time coded signals in respective first and second beams so that the first and second beams are contained within an angular spread of the angular power spectrum.